Old mudslingers right on the button

Sunday

Sep 30, 2012 at 6:00 AM

Sid McKeen Wry & Ginger

This year’s rollicking race for president has featured a little of everything, but one thing that’s been noticeably missing is the trash-talking campaign button. In an autumn filled with vast amounts of vituperation and vilification, 2012 has yet to produce a single memorable sarcastic button on either side of the race.

I’ve made a 60-year hobby of collecting election-campaign buttons. They cover an entire wall of my den, more than 600 in all — from William Jennings Bryan in 1896 down to the present — and take it from me, they don’t produce negative messages like they used to.

One of my favorites of the genre came from Democrats in 1972. Reminding voters of the Watergate scandal earlier in the year, they distributed pins — I have one on my wall — that read simply: “Nixon Has a Staff Infection.”

When President Franklin Roosevelt sought a third term in 1940 and spurred Republican buttons urging “No Crown for Franklin” and “Out Stealing Third,” his backers distributed buttons saying “Better a Third Termer than a Third Rater” and “Willkie for President of Commonwealth & Southern” (a job he once held). The GOP came right back with “Eleanor Start Packing, the Willkies are Coming.”

A popular button for Democrats in 1948 when Harry Truman ran for re-election was “Phooey on Dewey.” Republicans struck back with “Keep the Ass off the White House Grass — It’s all Dewey.” Sixteen years later, President Lyndon Johnson’s forces came up with “Hari-Kari with Barry” and “In Your Guts You Know He’s Nuts,” both aimed at Sen. Barry Goldwater. Republicans went after Johnson with the slogan, “Lyndon Baines Johnson for Coroner,” a not-so-veiled allusion to the Vietnam War, and “Keep America Beautiful — Get Rid of the Birds — Lucy, Lady and Lynda.”

But Ladybird, the First Lady, and her avian daughters stayed put at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue with LBJ for four more years.

Bay State Gov. Mike Dukakis, who headed the Democratic ticket in 1988, was met with one button that said, “Keep the A— in Mass” and another proclaiming, “As Massachusetts Goes, So Goes Massachusetts.”

When George W. Bush threw his hat in the ring in 2000, the opposition party handed out buttons with this sarcastic message: “Draft Dodgers for Bush.”

So where are all the wise guys today? Why aren’t we seeing any buttons or bumper stickers like these?: